Forgetting would be murder, wouldn't it?

My mother left me at an early age with only a sea-green amulet, and no one ever saw my father. Long ago, my town was in a cataclysmic famine, and blessings abundantly came when I arrived, thus the name Alwan.

One night, a multitude of pirates forayed and pillaged the whole town, prompting unprecedented destruction.

Dawn broke, and havoc grew restless. I sprawled out from the gnarled branches of a tree where I hid overnight. All of a sudden, a woman holding a conch appeared. She was naked, oddly radiant, and her presence—enigmatic and potent.

“Child, how are you still alive?”

Her voice was peculiarly dominating but altruistic. I was unable to respond. She floated away then I followed her. As I scanned my town's catastrophic state, I tried not to think how everyone was a man I knew. It was a nauseating chaos of bodies strewn everywhere.

Among one of the few standing houses was a wailing father. He’s clutching his dying daughter, ready to strike someone's chest with an arrow if they dare take her body away from him. He did not bat an eye at our arrival and constantly made inarticulate noises of ardent wrath and anguish I had never encountered before.

“What you see is grief—ugly and tangled. It is wishing for earthquakes, eruptions, and floods. Anything large enough to hold all of the rage. It weighs more than your own flesh, wondering how a body can withstand this,” said the woman.

“Goddess,” whispered the moribund daughter. From there, I knew it was her—Magwayen. Soon, the daughter’s soul was untethered from its physical vessel.

“Come. I prepared a place for you,” said Magwayen as we went to the town’s infamous river Lalangban, and ferried the daughter to a dimension I was forbidden to cross.

From another roof is the town’s Datu pondering the void. In his lap is the sagging corpse of his wife. He gently cupped her face while humming and uttering a soliloquy of his last message for her as if she were just napping.

“What you see is pure acceptance and resilience. Grief is also gentle, fluid, and yielding like how a river passes through rocks—what is soft is also strong; what is gentle perseveres.”

Then Magwayen in her majestic Balangay ferried the wife across the river.

The sun is setting over the sea, spilling its colors on the water’s surface. We headed to the shore and I suddenly saw my hands flickering. Feeling ghastly, I stopped, gasping for life recurrently.

But then I saw a little girl with a tear-stained face dragging my dead lethargic body. I was not hiding by the branch. I was pierced into it. I felt warmth as I bathed in my own blood and life itself slowly drifted away.

Magwayen dropped her glory. “What are you weeping for?”

“Alwan is gone,” Miga said as she unclasped the amulet from my neck. “Can you give him this?”

Magwayen refused and gave it back. “You are his primary keeper. You will immortalize him. You will tell your children and grandchildren stories and live long enough for it.”

Miga embraced it so dearly as if it would crumble like burnt papers.

“Don't let that sink to the bottom of the sea. Forgetting would be murder, wouldn't it?” Magwayen whispered softly.

I closed my eyes as we passed the liminal river between life and death. I relished as the waves echoed my name, revived the fleeting life I lived by those who loved us; and there I saw my deeds ripple across time.

I will be remembered.

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